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I wish you enjoyed a good summer: I did not. The very day we were supposed to be go on holiday, I was waiting at A&E with my husband, expecting him to have urgent but routine surgery, which caused our vacation arrangements needed to be cancelled.

From this situation I realized a truth important, all over again, about how difficult it is for me to acknowledge pain when things take a turn. I’m not talking about major catastrophes, but the more routine, subtly crushing disappointments that – without the ability to actually acknowledge them – will truly burden us.

When we were expected to be on holiday but were not, I kept sensing an urge towards finding the positive: “I can {book a replacement trip|schedule another vacation|arrange a different getaway”; “At least we have {travel insurance|coverage for trips|protection for journeys”; “This’ll give me {something to write about|material for an article|content for a story”. But I didn't improve, just a bit blue. And then I would bump up against the reality that this holiday really was gone: my husband’s surgery required frequent uncomfortable wound care, and there is a limited time window for an relaxing trip on the Belgian coast. So, no vacation. Just discontent and annoyance, hurt and nurturing.

I know more serious issues can happen, it's just a trip, an enviable dilemma to have – I know because I tried that line too. But what I wanted was to be sincere with my feelings. In those instances when I was able to halt battling the disappointment and we discussed it instead, it felt like we were going through something together. Instead of being down and trying to appear happy, I’ve given myself permission all sorts of unpleasant emotions, including but not limited to bitterness and resentment and aversion and wrath, which at least appeared genuine. At times, it even turned out to enjoy our time at home together.

This brought to mind of a wish I sometimes see in my counseling individuals, and that I have also seen in myself as a individual in analysis: that therapy could perhaps erase our difficult moments, like pressing a reset button. But that arrow only points backwards. Facing the reality that this is unattainable and accepting the grief and rage for things not turning out how we hoped, rather than a insincere positive spin, can enable a shift: from avoidance and sadness, to growth and possibility. Over time – and, of course, it requires patience – this can be transformative.

We view depression as being sad – but to my mind it’s a kind of dulling of all emotions, a repressing of anger and sadness and frustration and delight and energy, and all the rest. The opposite of depression is not happiness, but acknowledging every sentiment, a kind of genuine feeling freedom and liberty.

I have repeatedly found myself trapped in this wish to erase events, but my toddler is assisting me in moving past it. As a new mother, I was at times burdened by the astonishing demands of my newborn. Not only the nursing – sometimes for over an hour at a time, and then again less than an hour after that – and not only the diaper swaps, and then the changing again before you’ve even finished the task you were doing. These day-to-day precious tasks among so many others – functionality combined with nurturing – are a comfort and a tremendous privilege. Though they’re also, at moments, persistent and tiring. What astounded me the most – aside from the exhaustion – were the psychological needs.

I had thought my most key role as a mother was to satisfy my child's demands. But I soon realized that it was unfeasible to meet all of my baby’s needs at the time she demanded it. Her hunger could seem unmeetable; my milk could not come fast enough, or it came too fast. And then we needed to alter her clothes – but she disliked being changed, and wept as if she were plunging into a gloomy abyss of despair. And while sometimes she seemed consoled by the cuddles we gave her, at other times it felt as if she were distant from us, that nothing we had to offer could assist.

I soon discovered that my most crucial role as a mother was first to persevere, and then to support her in managing the powerful sentiments provoked by the impossibility of my shielding her from all distress. As she grew her ability to consume and process milk, she also had to cultivate a skill to process her feelings and her pain when the nourishment was delayed, or when she was hurting, or any other challenging and perplexing experience – and I had to develop alongside her (and my) annoyance, fury, despondency, aversion, letdown, craving. My job was not to ensure everything was perfect, but to help bring meaning to her feelings journey of things not going so well.

This was the difference, for her, between experiencing someone who was seeking to offer her only pleasant sentiments, and instead being assisted in developing a capacity to feel every emotion. It was the contrast, for me, between aiming to have excellent about executing ideally as a flawless caregiver, and instead developing the capacity to accept my own far-from-ideal-ness in order to do a good enough job – and grasp my daughter’s letdown and frustration with me. The distinction between my trying to stop her crying, and comprehending when she required to weep.

Now that we have developed beyond this together, I feel less keenly the wish to click erase and change our narrative into one where everything goes well. I find hope in my sense of a skill evolving internally to understand that this is not possible, and to realize that, when I’m occupied with attempting to rebook a holiday, what I really need is to weep.